Posted on 03/05/2006 9:27:12 PM PST by neverdem
Bird flu is on the wing in Asia, Africa and Europe. It is only a matter of time before it arrives in North America. Yet the supply of effective drugs everywhere is undermined by a plague of counterfeits for which governments are to blame.
The deadly H5N1 strain of the virus may not mutate into a form that can be transmitted between people, but people are right to be worried. The best drugs we have may be rendered useless by counterfeiters and complicit officials.
Fake drugs are a booming business in many poorer parts of the world, worth about $35 billion a year and making up 10 percent of all medicines. The U.N. warned this week that criminals are selling increasing amounts of avian flu drugs over the Internet. As well as lining criminals' pockets, these counterfeits could completely undermine treatment of victims in a pandemic.
Counterfeit drugs can make genuine, branded drugs useless. If they contain too little of the active ingredient, they can act like an "inoculation" to the virus, bacterium or parasite they are designed to kill. They could help the bird flu virus mutate into new, drug resistant strains, rendering existing treatments useless. In an avian flu pandemic, we really do not want the best current treatment, Tamiflu, to be redundant.
This is a very real and frightening prospect: It is already happening with malaria. Counterfeiters around the world have cashed in on the massive demand for the latest and most effective antimalarial drug, artemisinin. Over half the drugs sold in Southeast Asia contain incorrect levels of the active ingredient. Drug resistance to antimalarials is becoming a deadly problem -- more than 100,000 people die each year from fake antimalarials in Southeast Asia alone.
The same is true for the antiretroviral...
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
I'd be waitin for Chickin Litle but I believe he's joined the choir eternal, he breathes no more he's an ex chicken...
Why Doctors So Often Get It Wrong
How Often Are Patients Misdiagnosed?
Low-Tech Autopsies in the Era of High-Tech Medicine That's a pdf link. IIRC, Lundberg is a leftwing moonbat, but he's correct about the need for more autopsies.
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list. Anyone can post any unposted link as they see fit.
Thanks for the ping, neverdem,and for helping to keep us up on the latest.
See this line:"did her doctors realize that she had a potentially fatal flesh-eating infection. " It was "flesh-eating bacteria" until some pushey blogger wrote a letter to the author.
http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/2006/02/reporters-often-get-it-wrong-too.html
Making a difference where we can! (big grin)
MSM coverage of Iraq War is like a sports section written by women who hate sports.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.